


all we know is falling

by petitfleur (moonfleur)



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Established Relationship, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Idols, Love, M/M, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-09
Updated: 2020-01-09
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:00:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22182193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonfleur/pseuds/petitfleur
Summary: Everyone has their pillars - the people that prop them up when the world tries to tear us down. But what happens when their pillars get torn down first? For Joshua, well, he goes down with them.
Relationships: Choi Seungcheol | S.Coups/Hong Jisoo | Joshua, Choi Seungcheol | S.Coups/Hong Jisoo | Joshua/Yoon Jeonghan, Choi Seungcheol | S.Coups/Yoon Jeonghan, Hong Jisoo | Joshua/Yoon Jeonghan
Comments: 16
Kudos: 165
Collections: WIP OLYMPICS: WINTER 2019/20





	all we know is falling

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This is my measly contribution to the jihancheol tag because I've been missing 95z especially so and I just needed to write them. This is also my first foray into writing a poly so I hope that it reads okay, but I will say more in the end tags. Hope you like it!❤︎ PS. title taken from paramore's album of the same name :) 

Joshua pushed open the door to the dorm, electronic beeps of the keypad echoing loudly in the stillness of the landing. Maybe he should have taken up the members’ offer of late-night barbecue but it was too late, they’d long since split up — at the company, right after rehearsals for one of the music festivals. He no longer knew which festival it had been for — the last two weeks of practices and re-recordings have blurred into a flurry of colour, sounds and _5, 6, 7, 8s._ He was exhausted, and no, it wasn’t the physicality of it all — the physical stress he could take, but being branded the oldest now that Seungcheol and Jeonghan had gone on hiatus, that was a different thing entirely.

Suddenly, he was pulled to the forefront of all discussions, used as cannon fodder when the members and staff couldn’t decide on a setlist or choreography, the wall to take the arrows the staff shot at the members. It has only been a week since Jeonghan stepped down from the position but Joshua is riddled with holes with no one to help patch them up. He’d found himself appreciating Seungcheol, even more, these last few days. How had Seungcheol willingly taken all of this for _years_ when both he and Jeonghan had buckled under the weight after less than a month? 

The door opened into darkness, the only source of light the moon as it shone through the thin day blinds that hung over their balcony doors. Even then, the only thing that Joshua could make out was the jumbled heap of clothes piled onto Wonwoo’s bed right by the balcony, everything else was shrouded in darkness. And silence. It was so quiet. So used was Joshua to a full dorm where someone somewhere was always moving around at any point in time that the silence almost unnerved him. His eyes travelled naturally the door at the end of the hall, closed, no light leaking from behind it. Seungcheol must be asleep, which would explain the silence. Although Seungcheol was almost always asleep these days, or at least locked up in his room, only moving to answer when he or Jeonghan knocked on the door. 

His legs took him down the narrow hallway and he found himself hovering, wraith-like, in front of Seungcheol’s room, hand hovering unsteadily over the handle under the pretence of wanting to check on Seungcheol. Five minutes, five hours, five seconds later, he withdrew his hand — awareness of his own selfish intentions steering him clear of the door and into his own room where the last of his strength left him and he sank to the ground, knees giving way under him.

There he lay, his soft woollen rug underneath him — thankfully — for how long he didn’t know. It could have been minutes, it could have been hours — he no longer knew, he no longer cared. All he could think about was the silence and the darkness, the way they wrapped around him, layer after layer until he could no longer move, could no longer hear. The warmth from the ground heater seeped slowly into him, recharging him, pushing the cold and the tired out. Finally, _finally_ , he let himself relax — body, mind and spirit — for the first time in days, and he felt the stress leave him as an almost painful wetness that left streaks down his cheeks. He made no sound as he cried, or none that he could hear, wrapped as he was in his bubble of silence, but the tears dug grooves into his cheeks anyway as they poured out, neverending.

In hindsight, he must have made some sort of noise because suddenly there were arms, strong and steady, gathering him up the movement causing the shrouds of darkness and silence to fall away as he was lifted up off the floor gently and placed in a lap — equally as warm as the ground had been, but softer, and smelled vaguely of cocoa and firewood. He curled inwards towards the smell, a familiar sense of comfort spreading out from his chest to the tips of his toes, warming him better than the ground ever could. His fingers curled into a shirt — that smelled strangely different to the person but was no less comforting — as he pressed his face into the crook of a neck, the sound of his sniffles finally making their way to his own ears.

They remained like that, like two statues frozen in the bubble of time that encapsulated them, the only movement disrupting it being the arms as they rubbed life slowly back into Joshua. The silence had just settled around them when a voice broke it, low and husky, as though it hadn’t been used for days. _Baby, what’s wrong?_ And Joshua shattered, the pieces of him barely held together by the arms that had tightened their hold on him, pulling him closer until Joshua no longer knew where ended and the other began. He clung to that voice like a lifeline, no, not like, it _was_ a lifeline, pulling him out of the darkness he had been drowning in. He no longer knew when he’d last heard that voice, and he clutched at it, frantic, tears hot against his face.

_Cheol? Don’t leave me._

_Never_.

Warm hands carded through his hair, the motion soothing against his scalp, as lips pressed against his eyelids, soft and gentle, murmuring _I love yous_ and _I’m heres_ against his skin until his last sob left his body with a painful shudder. Seungcheol held him through it, like he’d always done, his presence the anchor that kept Joshua from drifting off too far, like Joshua had been for him during his storms. 

_Shua?_

Light entered the room, the darkness fleeing as it settled beside him and took his hand. The intensity made him blink, and blink he did, opening his eyes for the first time since the storm had hit. Surprisingly, he wasn’t blinded, instead coming face to face with warm brown eyes and a gentle smile. A soft hand made its way to his face, fingers careful as they brushed away the last of his tears.

_Hannie?_

He was transferred then, from one set of arms to another, from one hold to another — same, but also different. Because if Seungcheol was the anchor that stopped him from getting lost at sea, then Jeonghan was the light that guided him home — neither working without the other, neither saving without the other. And save him they did, Jeonghan bringing him back to the surface, where it was light and the darkness couldn’t get him. His lips ghosting over the places Seungcheol had placed his, warm and feather-light, before settling against Joshua’s own, breathing life back into him. 

And Joshua took, he took all that Jeonghan gave, and then gave it back two-fold, his hands finding purchase around Jeonghan’s neck and in his hair, words finding purchase against his lips. 

_You came for me._

_Always._

Hands wrapped themselves around him from behind, two pairs of hands to hold him steady, two pairs of lips to bring him back to life. He turned around, strength returning to his deadened limbs as he pressed back into Seungcheol, lips on lips, hands on hips, warmth blossoming between them. 

_I missed you, missed you both._

_We’re here, baby._

_We love you._

Tears rushed forth once more, but this time warm and dusted with light as he smiled for the first time in what felt like eons, laughing lightly as lips came up to brush the tears away. Gentle, soft, beckoning, the feel of them on his skin a resounding welcome home, and home he was, nestled between the two of them. And his home sheltered him and kept him. Strong hands lead him out of his room, held him steady as they undressed him, as they washed him. 

Fingers threaded through his hair, the firm pressure a complement to the warmth of the water and the warmth of the hands that scrubbed, gentle, the rest of his body and he let them. Let them wash the fear, the exhaustion, the darkness, down the drain along with the dirt and grime. Their voices velvet soft and echoing in the enclosed space as they spoke to him, stories about their day until he finally answered with stories about his. Joshua doesn’t think he’d ever forget the twin smiles that curled on their faces when his voice cut through theirs.

Finally cleaned and relaxed, Joshua returned the favour — he stripped them, washed them, pressed kisses into the curves of their backs and shoulders until they giggled, the sound a symphony to his hears. It was not long until he had a smile on his face to mirror theirs and a warmth in his chest that kept it there.

The darkness in Joshua’s room was comforting now, no longer cold and terrifying, now that he was wrapped up in warm limbs and soft blankets — the light of the moon the perfect amount of light for Joshua to make out the features on both their faces as they curled into him on both sides. So beautiful, he thought, moving to press his lips to their brows, a silent thank you that he knew they understood. It hit him then, with his mind finally returned to him, that he wasn’t the only one who was hurting, and he hadn’t thought to ask. So he did, whispered the words into the darkness and the slope of Seungcheol’s shoulder as he pulled them both closer, held them tighter. 

_Are you okay?_

_Now that you’re here._

_You make things better._

He couldn’t help the sigh that escaped him, relief flooding through him as he finally allowed himself to relax, body softening even more as Jeonghan curled around him from behind. He couldn’t fight the smile he pressed into Seungcheol’s chest as he snaked an arm around Seungcheol’s waist, tugging him closer until he was well and truly surrounded — arms thrown over him and legs a tangled mess of warmth. The smile deepened as he watched Jeonghan trace patterns into the skin of Seungcheol’s hip until he was humming with happiness, pushing himself up enough to press a kiss to Jeonghan list. Joshua’s heart sang as he watched them, love flowing through him, through all of them, transferring at every point of contact until they were so full with it that it poured out of them in waves. It made Joshua’s skin tingle and his chest swell but he was happy, and so were they, and he knew he didn’t have to say it — the words already embedded in his skin, in his heart, in his mind — but he said it anyway. 

_Love you both. So much._

_We love you too, Shua._

_Now hush, baby. Sleep._

And so, tangled between two people who he loved and who loved him more than life itself, and wrapped up in a love so much warmer than he could ever imagine, he slept. 

\---FIN---

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Whew! If you made it this far, then thank you so so much for reading! This was written in a style completely different to what I'm used to (don't ask me how it happened, my mind just goes with whatever it wants to) and I hope that it wasn't too confusing? Also I know that Jeonghan is back now but this takes place before all that when he and coups are still on hiatus. But, yes, this took a huge chunk out of me because the style was so different and I still don't really know how I feel about it but there you have it. Thank you again for reading!!❤︎
> 
> Find me on [twitter](http://twitter.com/moonfleur_) or [curious cat](http://curiouscat.me/moonfleur_) ♥︎


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